"Difficult?"
"Hard. It's never been this hard. I know this is going to sound totally whacked, but before when we broke up, I was kind of okay with it, because I realized that she was better off without me. And maybe I was better off without her. But this time I don't feel like she's better off at all. She's dissing her friends. She's losing herself in Chuck. And she and I--well, we've lost it."
"Lost what?"
[impatient] "You know--that spark. That electricity. Even when we were broken up, we had it. She could rile me up with a simple look, and I could do the same to her. Now that's not there. And I feel--I don't know."
"You feel naked without it?"
"Naked? Hah!"
I mean, you feel empty.
"Kind of. Is missing something proof of how much you were into it in the first place?"
[thinking again of Noah's smile] "Could be."
"So what do you do with that, Paul? What do you do with that missingness?"
"In some circumstances, you just let it go."
"Is this one of those circumstances?"
"What do you think?"
"I think no."
"I think you're right."
"So what are we going to do?"
"We're going to wait for Joni to feel the missingness, too."
"And what if she doesn't?"
[pause] "Then maybe we'll have to let it go."
[a little alarmed] "But not yet, right?"
"No, not yet."
"Because Joni's worth that, right?"
"Yeah, she is."
[hesitation] "I'm not really that drunk, okay?"
"It's okay, Ted."
"But you'll remind me of all this in the morning?"
"Yes, Ted."
"You're not that bad, Gay Boy."
"You're not too bad yourself, for a guy."
"Thanks."
"Anytime."
"But you'd prefer earlier?"
"Yeah, two's a little late."
"Cool. And hey--"
"Yeah?"
"Goodnight"
Meet Me at the Cemetery Gates
Because Amy and Emily have lacrosse practice and Infinite Darlene is prepping for the weekend's football game, we don't meet at the cemetery until the sun is going down. There is only one cemetery in our town, where people of all religions and beliefs rest side by side. Just like a community.
Although my father's parents were born and buried in another part of the country, all of my mother's family is buried here. I suppose one day my parents will be buried here, too. And even me. It's strange to walk around and think that.
In our cemetery, each tombstone has a locked box attached to it. And inside each locked box there's a book. I don't know who started this idea, or how long it's been around. But if you go to the cemetery gates, the keeper will give you the key to any box you'd like. Inside each book you will find the pages from a life. Some of the books have the dead person's own writing. Others have writing from after the death; people who come to visit the graves will write down memories and stories. Sometimes they'll write directly to the person, asking questions or giving updates on how everything turned out in the afterwards. Every now and then I'll look at my grandmother's book, which is filled with recipes and home truths. Or I'll take out a pen and add a line or two in my grandfather's book, telling him who won the World Series, if my mother hasn't already come by to fill
him in.
With the keeper's permission, we are going to take some words from the memory books to include in our dance. Amy and Emily are also going to make rubbings of some of the tombstones to help decorate the walls.
As soon as Kyle arrives at the cemetery, he goes looking for something. He doesn't tell any of us what it is. He disappears.
Of all the Club Kids, Amber is the only one who shows up. She arrives with Infinite Darlene, but it's Trilby who asks her for help.
"I need to get some ideas for a dress," Trilby says. "I need some input."
Amber lets out a starstruck "Sure."
Infinite Darlene is miffed. "It won't be as good as last year's dress," she bitches.
"Oh, please," Trilby snorts. "You wanted me to wear yellow so you could take home all the boys."
"The theme was Sound of Music--and they were yellow curtains."
"Yes, but there are good curtains and there are bad curtains. You had me wearing some pretty bad curtains."
"You didn't think so at the time."
"Oh, but I'm wiser now."
To my surprise, it's Amber who steps in this time.
"Do you guys always do this?" she asks.
"Yes," Trilby and Infinite Darlene reply together. Then they try to jinx each other, but that too is simultaneous.
"And what do you get out of it?" Amber asks.
"Excuse me?" Trilby looks a little down her nose at Amber. Amber seems to fade into her overalls, but she's gone too far now to turn back.
"It's clear to everyone how much you're getting off on getting even," she observes. "Can't you just admit that?"
"No way."
"You're out of your mind."
"Am I?"
Trilby gives Amber a serious once-over. "I think I'll go look for dress ideas myself. I don't know why I asked a girl wearing OshKosh to help me in the first place."
"They're not OshKosh. They're Old Navy."
"That's not my point."
"Yeah, but it's mine."
Trilby storms off dramatically. Infinite Darlene storms off with equal drama in the opposite direction.
Amber laughs.
"Well done," I say. "I swear, if you weren't an Old Navy--wearing lesbian Club Kid, I'd probably kiss you right now."
Amber's laugh stops. She looks around to see if anyone's heard.
I've gone too jar, I think.
"I'm sorry," I say.
Amber waves me off. "It's okay. It's just that I'm not. . . well, I don't like to think of myself as . . . a Club Kid."
She smiles again.
"I'll never think of you that way again," I promise.
"I mean, I love joining clubs and all. I just don't want word to get out, okay?"
Her secret is safe with me.
Away from the Club Kids, she's so much more sure of herself. Or maybe she's just as sure of herself when she's with the other Club Kids, only she doesn't have a chance to show it.
"Trilby and Infinite Darlene are like Nelly Peterson and George Bly," Amber observes.
"Nelly and George were great friends until they started competing for valedictorian. Now it's all about the grades. They want to beat each other, and at the same time they secretly want to be each other. So they fight."
"And how will it end?"
"They'll either kill each other or sleep together. The jury's still out."
"But Trilby and Infinite Darlene don't want to sleep together-- they want to sleep with the same people."
"Different kind of tension, same emotional results. Plus, who says they don't want to sleep together?"
"Are you saying that Infinite Darlene is a lesbian?"
"Stranger things have happened. And that's just in this town." Amber looks across the cemetery. "You know who I like the most in here?"
"Who?"
"The witch in the corner. She lived here two hundred years ago. Her memory book is full of spells that have been written in over the years."
"You like that?"
Amber nods. "I once went out with a witch. It didn't end well."
"What happened?"
"I didn't get along with her cat."
We are quiet again in the near dark. I realize I should be doing some serious architecting at this point, but I'm not sure what to do. Suddenly, Amy and Emily are lit by a flash as they trace gravestone inscriptions. Then another flash. Someone is taking pictures.
Noah.
Infinite Darlene sidles up behind me.
"I asked him to come," she whispered. "I figured we could use some black-and-white shots."
; "You're interfering!" I accuse.
She bats an eyelash. "Of course I am. That's what friends are for."
Noah doesn't seem to notice me. He focuses on the gnarled branches reaching out to cover the emerging moon. He focuses on the angel statuary, making their wings turn a ghostly pale in one illuminated moment.
"Go over and say hello," Infinite Darlene insists.
"You're the one who invited him," I grumble.
"Yes, but you're the host"
I'm ready to dig in my heels and resist Infinite Darlene's meddling. Then Amber asks me,
"What do you really want to do?" And I think about it. What I want to do is run away into the darkness. What I really want to do is talk to him.
So I walk over.
He is sitting on the ground now, getting a level shot of a tombstone.
"Hey," I say.
Snap and flash. My eyes take a second to readjust. He stands in the afterglow.
"Hey," he says.
It's too dark for me to see his full expression.
"I'm glad you're taking pictures," I go on. "I mean, it was a good idea."
"Did you ask Infinite Darlene to ask me?" His voice is casual curiosity, nothing more.
"No. But I should have."
"Why?"
"Because you're a really good photographer."
He thanks me and we teeter there for a moment. We are not moving, but we're teetering at the same time.
"Look . . ." I've missed you. Do I really have to say it? Can't he see it on my face? I'm about to say it--then I hear someone calling my name.
"Paul! You've got to come see this, Paul!"
It's Kyle. He runs over to me, not seeing Noah.
"Oh, sorry," he says when he realizes I'm not alone.
"No problem," Noah replies, raising his camera from his side.
Don't go, I want to say. But I can't say it in front of Kyle, who looks so excited to have found me.
The moment's over. Noah nods at me and Kyle, then walks away. I call out another thanks to him, but he only sends back another nod.
"Sorry," Kyle says again. "I didn't know you were--"
"He was just taking some shots of the cemetery for the dance. Infinite Darlene asked him."
- We stand there for a moment, Kyle looking at me.
"You wanted to show me something?" I prompt.
"Yeah. This way."
He takes me to the dowager's crypt. I had forgotten all about it.
Kyle has lit the inside with candles, so as we approach, it looks like an elfin mansion with a fire in the grate. The outside is plain ("I won't be seeing it from the outside," the dowager is rumored to have said), but the inside is colored fifty-two different shades of blue. Every year or two they touch it up, importing paint from as far away as Cyprus to make the blue complete.
Kyle got the key to her memory book from the keeper and has been jotting excerpts into his biology notebook. I lean over to see, but he quickly closes the cover and shuffles the notebook away in his bag. I look around at the candles he's lit. They, too, are all blue.
"I wish we could have the dance in here," Kyle says, nodding to a portrait of the dowager that hangs over her tomb. It is nearly identical to the portrait that is partnered at the dance. "I think she would have liked that."
Next to the portrait is a piece of sketch paper. Kyle must have been trying to duplicate it. I walk forward for a closer look.
"I'm sorry again about interrupting," Kyle says from somewhere behind me.
"Don't worry about it," I reply, my eyes not leaving the drawing. He's changed the perspective--it's now a portrait looking slightly down. The candlelight makes her expression waver, her lines blur. The thing that strikes me the most is the portrait's silence.
I feel a hand on my back. When I don't move, Kyle turns me gently around. Then he leans in and kisses me. Softly, at first. Then embracing.
My instinct kicks in, and it isn't the instinct I'm necessarily expecting. After the surprise wears off, I quietly step away. I let go of the kiss, and he lets go of my body.
"What?" he asks soothingly. "It's okay."
"No," I whisper back. "It's not."
"But it is." He takes my hand in his. I used to love it when he did that, just casually holding my hand as we had a conversation. I don't pull it away now. "I know I messed up last time,"
he says, "but that won't happen again. I know you're scared. I'm scared, too. But this is what I want. This is how it should be. I love you."
"Oh no!" I say. Out loud. I don't mean to. It just comes out.
Kyle laughs, but I can see his scaredness grow.
I squeeze his hand lightly. "Seriously, though. I just--" I can't find the right words.
"You just what?"
"I just don't want to. Not like that. I love you, too, but as a friend. A good friend."
He lets go of my hand. "Don't say that," he insists.
"What? I mean it, Kyle. You know I'm not just saying 'let's be friends.'"
"But you are, Paul. You are."
There's shock in his eyes now. I actually have to reach out for him because he's about to back into a candle and set his shirt on fire.
"Thanks," he says. His voice has lost all certainty. "But why did you kiss me? I thought that meant something."
I can't tell him it meant nothing. But I can't tell him it meant what he wanted it to.
"Do you regret it?" he asks, after I haven't responded.
"No," I say, even though I do.
"But you don't want to do it again?"
"I don't think we should."
"And you know what you want."
I nod.
"You always know what you want, don't you?"
"That's not true," I say, thinking about the last two weeks. "And that's not fair."
"No," Kyle agrees. "It's not fair at all." He is back by his book bag now, gathering his things.
"I thought this would work. I thought it would be a perfect way to start again. But I forgot about you. I forgot how easy it is for you."
"Easy?"
"Yes," Kyle says, punctuating the phrase by throwing down his things. "Easy. Paul, you don't know how lucky you are."
"How am I lucky?"
"Because you know who you are. Most of the time, Paul, I have no idea what I want. And then when I do, something like this happens. You make me feel so low, when all I want is to be with you."
I could point out that he used to make me feel the same way, but I've already forgiven him for that. I could point out that it isn't always easy knowing who you are and what you want, because then you have no excuse for not trying to get it. I could point out that right now--
even now--I am still thinking about the few words I just exchanged with Noah. I could point out any number of things. But I am entirely disarmed, because now Kyle is shivering in front of me, holding in his tears as he picks up his bag. "I'm sorry," I say, but I know this isn't enough. There isn't a single phrase for all the things I need to say--there isn't a single sentence that will explain how I want to hug Kyle into security but don't want to kiss him. He is walking around the crypt now, not looking at me, not saying another word. He blows out the candles one by one. I stand where I am and say his name. The last candle is on top of the dowager's tomb. Kyle leans over and extinguishes it. We are left in a darkness of blues. I say his name again. But the only response comes from the sound of his leaving.
Tony
I ask Amber to call Tony's house for me. When he answers, she passes the phone my way and I ask if I can come over. He says there's about an hour before his mother will be back from her prayer circle.
Emily gives me a ride. From her respectful silence, I can tell that she's pieced together Kyle's departure, my agitation, my own departure, and my need for respectful silence. She's probably figured out a close variation of the real story.